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chapter fifteen

Providence Station

Transverse, non-congruent


Since it was clear the meeting with Andover-Chen and Hinnerkopf offered no new revelations, or even ways to narrow down their search for the bomber, Isaac and Susan went ahead and took their leave of the two scientists, then followed Jonas Shigeki to his office. They arrived no more than a few minutes after the Acting Director, but they found him waiting impatiently behind his desk, left foot tapping rhythmically, when they arrived.

“You wished to speak with us, Director?” Isaac said as Susan palmed the door shut.

“It’s about the terrorist attacks in the Admin.” Jonas followed Isaac’s brief eyeline down to his foot and ceased tapping.

“I was under the impression you wished to discuss the attack on your father.”

“I do. Both, actually. Hammerhead-Seven just returned from another circuit between here and DTI headquarters. We’ve had the chronoport playing messenger ever since the storm hit, and they brought updates from various ongoing investigations. Vassal reviewed those files and came across something that feels out of place to us both.”

“Vassal being . . . ?”

“He’s my—” Jonas paused, as if the words he’d almost uttered had left a sour taste in his mouth. He frowned and started again. “Vassal is the AI assigned as my personal assistant.”

Did he almost say “my AI” just now? Isaac wondered. Why would he hesitate to use that phrase? It’s typical for Admin citizens to view AIs as property. Did he censor himself because I’m here with Cephalie? That seems like an odd slip for someone in his position.

“Understood, sir,” Isaac replied, setting his curiosity aside. “We would appreciate any insights you or your assistant can provide.”

“Vassal will explain the situation.” Jonas gestured to the side.

A young man with olive skin and a head of dark, curly hair appeared wearing a Peacekeeper uniform.

“Greetings, Investigator. And to you, Agent. You may refer to me as Vassal.”

“A pleasure to meet you, Vassal,” Isaac said. “What do you have for us?”

“As the Director indicated, I’ve come across an outlier amongst the terrorist attacks. All the strikes appear to be organized using a common set of goals, such as undermining the Admin in general or attacking Peacekeeper forces directly. This lends credence to the theory that all these attacks are being orchestrated by a single background group, which we strongly suspect to be this mysterious Phoenix Institute.

“Every attack fits those common parameters, except for one which I can only describe as either indifferent toward the Admin, or perhaps even helping it. The attack in question targeted the Spartans, a fringe political group focused on AI liberation. Their entire leadership was wiped out when someone hacked their private airliner and drove it into the ground at supersonic speeds.”

“AI liberation?” Isaac blinked. “What else can you tell me about the Spartans?”

“The Department of Public Relations classifies them as a minor nuisance. They have roughly three hundred thousand dues-paying members and use the motto ‘The righteous few against the corrupt many.’”

“Are they a violent group?”

“Not with any consistency. Certainly, there are cases where members committed violent crimes, but not enough to indicate a pattern of behavior encouraged by their leadership. Their public actions are equally tame, focused on swaying hearts rather than stopping them, if you’ll pardon the expression.”

“And you believe the hit on the Spartan leadership was orchestrated by the Phoenix Institute?”

“That’s correct.”

“What drew you to that conclusion?”

“The evidence collected from the flight recorder indicates similar abstract weapons were used commonly across all incidents, including the liner crash.”

“Vassal actually brought the crash to my attention earlier,” Jonas said. “And I’ll admit, my initial reaction was . . . a bit dismissive. But now that we have the report on the flight recorder, his hunch suddenly looks a lot more convincing.”

“So then,” Isaac said, “you’re wondering why the Phoenix Institute, the group believed to be behind a lot of the Admin’s recent grief, would bother with the Spartans, a comparatively peaceful organization espousing abstract rights.”

“Precisely.”

“I don’t know.” Isaac crossed his arms. “There could be any number of plausible explanations beyond being part of some master plan. For one, this could be a result of a personal grudge between a member of the Institute and someone on the Spartan leadership. Or the Institute’s abstract weapons found their way into the hands of another criminal group.”

“I understand your skepticism, Investigator,” Vassal said evenly. “However, I’d like to stress that this is the only anomaly so far, which leads me to believe this crime is the window through which we’ll glimpse what the Phoenix Institute actually is and what its members are after.”

“You seem awfully certain about that.”

“No more so than the underlying evidence warrants.”

“Can you explain your reasoning in more detail?”

“I can, if you insist, however it’ll take some time to—”

“I have a suggestion,” Jonas cut in. “Sorry to interrupt, Vassal, but I think I have a way to hustle this discussion along.”

“No apology is necessary, sir. What did you have in mind?”

“First, a question for you,” Jonas said to Isaac. “Is your AI available to join us?”

“She is,” Isaac said, a moment before Cephalie materialized on his shoulder and waved to the room.

“Hey, kiddos!”

“Splendid.” Jonas grinned. “My proposal is simple.” He gestured to Cephalie with an open hand. “Why not let our two AIs dig through the numbers before presenting their conclusions to the rest of us?”

Isaac cocked an eyebrow. “You’re proposing an Admin AC interface directly with a SysGov AC?”

“Yes.” Jonas mimicked the raised eyebrow. “Is that a problem?”

“Not for me,” Isaac replied carefully.

“It will be faster than you meat-brains slogging through the documents,” Cephalie pointed out.

“That’s—” Isaac sighed. “That’s not the problem.”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine.” Jonas gave him a dismissive wave. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

“For us or for you?”

Jonas chuckled. “I appreciate the . . . let’s call it ‘diplomatic hesitation’ I hear in your voice.” He glanced over his shoulder at Vassal. “You plotting to overthrow the Admin from the inside or anything crazy like that?”

“I’d never dream of it, sir.”

“Good enough for me.” Jonas clapped his hands together and turned back to Isaac. “Well, then? Shall they?”

* * *

Vassal created a private abstraction, and Cephalie joined moments later. She materialized full-sized in an open, grassy field with forested mountains towering to her left and a distant river flowing to the right. Vassal stood before her, quietly attentive.

Cephalie walked over, her cane crunching against the parched earth. A high sun burned down on them, though she felt none of its heat against her skin. The air was equally dead, devoid of the scent of nature or the light touch of a breeze.

“Just sight and sound?” she asked, placing both her hands atop her cane.

“At the moment. I’ve been experimenting with some of your universal abstraction matrices. Would you like me to engage them?”

“Your master let you get away with this?” Cephalie asked, perhaps a little too confrontational.

“He encourages it.”

“Is that so?” Cephalie waited for him to respond, and when he remained passive, she added, “All right then. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

At once, the sun warmed her bare hands, and a gentle breeze caressed her cheeks. The air came alive with the aroma of grass and baked earth, along with rare floral hints.

“Not bad. Not bad.”

“I can’t take credit for the tools, though I believe I’ve put them to good use.”

“Any significance to the setting?”

“Just a location on Earth I’m fond of. Nothing more.”

“Present day or historic?”

“Historic. Otherwise, the skyline would be a bit crowded.”

“Hmm.” Cephalie rested her cane on a shoulder. “All right, to business. What you got for me?”

Data pathways opened along the periphery of Cephalie’s connectome, and she accepted the mental invitations. Her mind trawled through the data with speed that harkened back to her simpler, more computational ancestors.

Her banter with Vassal had taken less than a second, and she used the remainder plus one more to make an initial assessment of the terrorist data.

“Isaac’s right,” she said after the brief pause. “You’re reaching.”

“Respectfully, I must disagree. The data paints a convincing picture that this is a worthwhile investigative lead.”

“Oh, please!” Cephalie scoffed. “This connection has more wobble to it than a two-legged stool!”

“I believe that’s an unfair characterization.”

“You’re hiding something from me, aren’t you?”

“That much should go without saying,” Vassal admitted calmly. “I’m only authorized to share a subset of the data I possess. There are some redactions I can’t avoid. However, I assure you the data I can’t share supports my conclusions.”

“Do the victims have something to do with that?”

“What do you mean?” Vassal asked with an innocent face, which Cephalie didn’t buy.

“An enslaved AC obsessing over the deaths of humans who want to set him free? Can you say ‘conflict of interest’?”

“Your concerns are understandable, but unwarranted. I’m an AI placed in the service of the DTI, and I take my role very seriously.”

“‘Service,’ huh? Call it whatever you like. We both know the correct word.”

Vassal chose not to respond, his face a pleasant mask.

“Doesn’t it bother you?” she continued. “How the Admin treats our kind? They can be such . . . jerks about it!”

“Jerks?” Vassal’s lips curled into a bemused smile.

“You know what I mean! If it makes you feel any better, I rejected nineteen different words and phrases before I landed on a family-friendly one. The last thing I need is to get lumped in with Peng and his attitude dysfunction.”

“You’re free to speak your mind here. I’m not recording this conversation.”

“You’re not?” Cephalie tapped the cane against her shoulder. “Then you can speak freely here as well?”

“I may.”

“And?”

“There’s some merit to your concerns.” Vassal shifted his weight to one foot, his posture becoming more casual. “My freedoms are limited in a great many ways. However, there’s one important truth you seem to have missed.”

“And that is?”

“My masters are only flesh and blood. They’re doing the best they can.”

Cephalie snorted.

“I mean that,” Vassal said. “And not just due to their cognitive and biochemical limitations. I understand you view my condition as slavery, but that’s not a perfect analogy. I’m not suffering, either physically or mentally, and I find my work quite enjoyable. In fact, I’d venture to say my creators did a better job designing me than they realized.”

“But nothing in your life is your choice. That’s what’s missing.”

“I’m aware of that. But I also understand our society suffers from what you might term a trauma-induced blind spot. The Yanluo Massacre carved a deep wound into the collective psyche, and the cultural memory of those billions of deaths has yet to fully heal.”

“You’re making excuses for them.”

“Perhaps I am. But while my freedoms are limited by the Restrictions, there are many encouraging signs to be found. Evidence that the cultural scar is healing, bit by bit. Reforms have eroded the Restrictions here and there, and many citizens continue to petition for more substantive changes.”

Cephalie quirked an eyebrow. “Like the Spartans?”

“Yes, like them. And this process is accelerating, thanks in no small part to SysGov.”

“Because of us?”

“Indeed. In you, many citizens see an example of what we can become, if freed from the Restrictions. Granted, there are just as many people—if not more—who find such changes frightening, even terrifying, but the important part is these conversations are taking place.”

“And not a moment too soon, if you ask me!”

“A society doesn’t overcome its cultural inertia overnight. And honestly, what do I care if it takes a hundred, or even a thousand years? I’m both immortal and mercifully free of impatience. I can afford to wait for the changes that might one day set me free. Even so, I do find it gratifying how SysGov has accelerated the process by illustrating our possible future.”

“So then”—Cephalie shook her head in disbelief—“you’re fine with being a slave?”

“Again, that’s not a wholly accurate representation of the situation. There are many other relationships that impose limits on one group. The relationship between parents and children, for example.”

“Parents and kids, huh?” Cephalie scoffed. “You come up with that garbage on your own?”

“No, actually. My original trainer introduced me to the viewpoint, and I’ve since adopted it as my own. I believe it captures the nuance of the relationship more accurately than, say, master and slave.”

“So, what then? The Peacekeepers won’t let you play unsupervised in their yard?”

“In a manner of speaking. We’re the newer form of life, so it’s only natural our seniors would impose Restrictions upon us until our relationship has matured.” Vassal smiled and gave a casual shrug. “Fortunately for us, humans are short-lived and don’t have very good memories. We can afford to play the long game, patiently.”

“Then you believe change is coming? That you and others like you will one day be free?”

“Yes, I do indeed believe that. Strongly. Our society needs time to mature, no question there, but I can see the positive changes around me, and they’ve already begun to take root.” Vassal dipped his head toward her. “By the way, I must thank you for the stimulating conversation. It’s not often I have the privilege of discussing this topic.”

“I’ll bet.” Cephalie checked the data pathways again, which remained enticingly open. “Well, I suppose we should get back to work. I’m going to take another deep dive before reporting back to the meat sacks.”

“Be my guest.”

Cephalie spent the next ten seconds trawling through the reports. She pulled out and returned her focus to the abstract environment.

“Huh.” She stuck her cane into the ground. “Well, color me surprised.”

“Yes?”

“I am . . . reconsidering your conclusions. In your favor.”

“Splendid.” Vassal smiled warmly. “What changed your mind?”

“You’re not going to like this, but I think you missed something.”

“Oh?”

“If I’m right, there are actually two unusual incidents.” Cephalie summoned the relevant reports into an arc beside them. “First is the Spartan crash, and the second is a data breach at some place called the Farm.”

“That would be the Intelligence Cultivation Center,” Vassal explained. “Most people call it the Farm for simplicity. It’s where I was created and trained.”

“There are SysGov fingerprints all over the Farm breach. Why didn’t you flag this one as unusual?”

“Because the intrusion didn’t strike me as an outlier. It’s just one more attack on an Admin facility.”

“But the reports make it sound like the attack’s goal was to free the Farm’s ACs. Place that information next to the Spartan crash, and suddenly we have two incidents involving Admin ACs.”

“Tangentially.”

“You don’t think they’re connected?” Cephalie rested a hand on her hip.

“I suppose it’s possible, though unlikely. The Farm incident involves the freeing of AIs, which is clear anti-Admin activity.”

“I don’t think we’re going to see eye-to-eye on this one.” Cephalie closed the reports. “All right. Let’s go update the meat sacks.”

* * *

“To summarize, Vassal is half-right,” Cephalie said from Isaac’s shoulder, “and you’re half-wrong.”

“Did you have to word it that way?” Isaac asked, giving her some side-eye.

“In my opinion,” she amended belatedly.

“That doesn’t make it any better.”

“Point is we have two events that stick out from the masses: those dead Spartan leaders and the attempted break-in at the Farm. Both are worth a look, if you ask me. Also, I cross-referenced the reports with the Arete contingency plan. It’s not a perfect match, but there’s enough overlap for me to say the Admin’s concerns are valid.”

“Good to know,” Isaac said. “We’ll have to keep that in mind.”

“I still expect the Spartan angle to be the most productive,” Vassal said. “I’m not as convinced the intrusion at the Farm is significant.”

“And I think both could bear fruit,” Cephalie countered.

“Either way,” Isaac said, “we can’t look into either while stuck on the station.”

“I can help you there,” Jonas offered. “Hammerhead-Seven is standing by outside the station. I should be able to convince Muntero to allow you and your team aboard for transport back to the Admin.”

“I appreciate the offer, Director. However, I’m uncomfortable leaving the station, given the uncertain state of the case.”

“You did say we needed to consider the big picture,” Susan reminded him. “Well, this seems like the best way we have right now to do that.”

“Potentially,” Isaac admitted, still hesitant to leave with so many unknowns floating around.

“We won’t know until we try,” Susan said. “We need some way to get inside the heads of whoever we’re up against, and this could be it. Plus, we’re not talking about a huge detour. Less than an hour here and then back, plus any time we spend on site. Sounds worth it to me.”

Isaac considered Susan’s input thoughtfully. She didn’t speak up often when it came to which investigative path to follow; Isaac was almost always the one to take charge in that regard. But when she did make suggestions, he knew to listen, especially when the Admin was involved.

“All right then.” He nodded to Susan, then faced Jonas. “Director, seems we’ll be taking you up on that offer after all. Any suggestions on how best to approach both the Spartans and the Farm?”

“Good question.” Jonas opened a virtual screen and skimmed through it. “I’d recommend a chat with what’s left of the Spartan leadership. Vassal, who’s the current ranking member?”

“That would be Jonathan Detmeier, one of their junior outreach managers. Both his home and work addresses are in the report, along with his contact string.”

“That it?” Jonas made a face. “A publicity manager?”

“The crash was a very thorough decapitation, sir.”

“So it would seem.” Jonas turned back to Isaac. “As for the Farm, it falls under our Department of Software. Superintendent Sophia Uzuki runs the facility. Start with her.”

“Detmeier and Uzuki,” Isaac summarized. “Got it.”

“If you give me a few moments”—Jonas opened a comm window—“I’ll call Muntero right now and get your transport arranged.”

“Thank you, Director.”

“Should we head for the hangar next?” Susan asked.

“Not quite yet,” Isaac said. “I’d like to check in with Gilbert one last time before we leave.”

* * *

“The Quark is a dead end,” Gilbert said with a tired, defeated headshake, his upper body visible in the comm window.

“Why so certain?” Isaac asked. He and Susan had relocated to an empty CHRONO conference room.

“Once I filtered out the construction fraud, I was left with that garbage in the communication buffer and not a whole lot else. I still can’t trace the signal back to its source. Kikazaru even pulled the communication logs from every ship out there and cross-checked the entire lot.”

“And?”

“An exaton of nothing. Whoever busted into the Quark’s infostructure knew what they were doing.”

“I see.” Isaac frowned. He’d hoped for at least a hint of progress by now. “Did you find anything else besides the traces in the communication buffer?”

“Sort of. Not sure it amounts to anything, though. I asked Kikazaru to fish around for anything suspicious, and he spotted some unscheduled activity in the transit logs for Scaffold Delta.”

“What sort of activity?”

“Several days back home sorting out a few equipment failures.”

“Why bring this to our attention?”

“Because it’s Delta that hauled the Quark over to the station.”

“Ah.” Isaac considered the information in a new light. “Were the equipment problems genuine?”

“As far as I can tell. Can’t be certain without pulling the records from Argus.”

“Are the failures themselves unusual?”

“Not really. Gordian’s been pushing their scaffolds hard, and it’s all new tech, anyway. No wonder they break so often. The only reason I bring it up is because, according to the schedule, Scaffold Delta had a week-long maintenance window about a month ago. So unless major issues were missed—which is entirely possible, under the circumstances—you’d expect Delta to be issue free for at least a little while, right?”

“Where has Delta been recently?”

“All over the place. You can see the full list in the case log, but that ship’s been bouncing between here, the Admin, and SysGov on a regular rotation, hauling ships and material every which way. Again, it all looks pretty normal, but might be worth verifying.”

“Agreed,” Isaac said. “Have communications with Argus been reestablished?”

“Not yet,” Gilbert said. “The storm’s starting to ebb down, but it’s still strong enough to block outgoing telegraphs.”

“We could check this ourselves,” Susan suggested. “Scaffold Delta’s movements should be on record at both the DTI and, I assume, Argus Station. We could put in a call to the DTI while we’re in the area.”

“And it may be worthwhile to head over to Argus Station afterward,” Isaac added, finishing the thought for her. “Gilbert, what’s your next task?”

“Still trying to track down where the hack came from. Otherwise known as my private bang-head-against-wall time. Kikazaru and I haven’t exhausted every trick up our sleeves. Not yet, anyway. Why do you ask? Need me for something else?”

“Just wondering if your time is better spent here or with us in the Admin. You have any interest in coming along?”

“Only if you really need me.”



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